Quote Originally Posted by spud View Post
...I think there is a lot of people that are interested in the possibilities of fall tapping but just not sure if it would pay to do it.
That is exactly the way people should be thinking about fall tapping....or any other change in their maple operation. If it doesn't result in an economic net profit, don't do it. There are lots of things we can do to improve sap yields, but it becomes a matter of diminishing returns, so sometimes that extra 0.5 gal/tap costs you more to get than you can get for the syrup. You want to do things that result in the biggest bang (net profit) for the buck.

At this point, I don't think there is enough information to say for sure one way or the other about fall tapping + spring reaming, but it certainly is worthy of further trials and research....and is probably more viable given that folks tend to be doing a whole lot better these days with taphole/tubing sanitation. Unfortunately, as it typical, it's going to take a while for the answers to be in. In the real long run, with climate change (regardless of what you think might be causing it), fall+spring tapping might be the way to go.